In creating ‘Worlds In A Life, Two’ on the fly, Thollem put the impulsiveness into this recycled music that you can’t get by pondering over it too long.

The Matthew Shipp Trio’s ‘New Concepts in Piano Trio Jazz’ further obliterates the line between composed and cursive, allowing for prettier melodic development while retaining all the element of surprise.

Ivo Perelman and Matthew Shipp both thrive on finding different partners with which to exchange fresh ideas, but they always return to this special duo.

Matthew Shipp’s compositional skills are standout on his trio’s latest collection ‘World Construct,’ usually an approach that is at once very captivating and idiosyncratic.

The challenge for listeners to keep up is also central to the thrill of listening to ‘Cool With That’ by the improvised music supergroup East Axis.

Michael Bisio, Kirk Knuffke and Fred Lonberg-Holm are artistic rebels as Robert Henri was, but their music isn’t outside just for the sake of being outside.

‘Confabulations’ wasn’t made with the public in mind, and that might be why this makes such a great entry point for the avant-garde side of Duck Baker.

There’s never been a 21st century ESP-Disc that’s sounded so much like a mid-’60s ESP-Disk record than ‘Winter Garden’ by the Flow Trio with Joe McPhee.

‘Threads’ is the kind of opening statement that usually takes several tries to nail down, but the Caterpillar Quartet blends a variety of styles to make ostensibly jazz that’s often hard to neatly categorize when you dig deep into these songs.

Thankfully ESP-Disk made the call to get out to the world Owl Xounds Exploding Galaxy’s ‘The Coalescence,’ a valuable relic from an audacious NYC Downtown band that shouldn’t be forgotten.